Financial Planning
November 12, 2024
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Written by: Tony Christensen, CFP®, CHFC®, Founding Partner
For those of you that play golf, I’m sure you can relate. When I first started playing golf, I hired a golf coach for a span of a couple years while playing for the high school team. There is one piece of advice that sticks out to me to this day:
In my opinion, the difference between the pros and the amateurs is not incredible shots, it’s the lack of bad ones. The pros know course management better than anyone in the world. They know their strengths and weaknesses. So when you or I are considering how far we can hit our next shot, they are planning the next shot thinking, “with which club am I the most accurate with”. They are considering the bunkers that they may have to clear, the out-of-bounds stakes on the left side of the fairway, the pin placement on the green. They are weighing out those risks of whether it’s worth going for or not.
I remember playing multiple practice rounds with my golf coach.
There were countless times that he would stop me from hitting the shot I planned, explaining to me that the risks were not worth it given the landscape of the hole. I remember going to the State Golf tournament my senior year. I was in 1st place at 4 undergoing into the final 4 holes. Regretfully, I admit that the greed took over in my over-confident state of being. My coach was not with me at the time. So naturally, I made some poor club choices causing me to hit “bad shots”, that resulted in me not even placing in the top 5. In wealth management, there are several strategies and ways to accomplish a goal and an argument can be made for each.
So, how does one financial advisor separate themselves from the others?
The top Advisors are in the business of helping their clients make difficult financial decisions in all areas of their financial life. Through this decision-making process, a client has a “Coach” that enables them to avoid the really “bad shots” that tend to cause major mistakes. Smaller mistakes may happen, but typically are overcome. More than likely, there are several decisions that you need to be making in regard to your financial well-being. I suggest you have those “coaching sessions” with your financial advisor and make sure you are on the right track. Our firm has compiled a list of common mistakes that we see our clients and friends make. Feel free to call our office or email me if you would like a copy.
